Good stuff for GMs from around the web:  You Could Learn A Lot From Lou Scheimer (Part I): Over on I Waste The Buddha With My Crossbow, Dr. Rotwang has a great post about running pulp sessions where the action literally never lets up. His jumping-off point is the 1979 pilot of the animated...

Three great links from the GMing community:  Behind the Screen: Listen to your players…: Dante of the new site Stupid Ranger posted this little gem about paying attention to what your players say at the table. Sounds obvious, right? Well, it is — but in a good way. Since getting...

In the comments on Help Your Players Hone their PCs During Chargen, TT reader Telas suggested this topic: “Good vs bad GMPCs…” (Thanks, Telas!) GMPC stands for Game Master Player Character, and most often refers to an NPC that is part of the party, and takes part in all or most adventures with the...

Way back in 1992, Dragon Magazine #184 featured an article by C.M. Cline entitled “The 7-Sentence NPC,” and it’s by far one of the best GMing tools I’ve ever used. I mentioned it in 2005’s Vibrant NPCs here on TT, but I thought it deserved a post of its own. The basic...

Just lately, I’ve come across a bevy of good GMing links. I figured I’d share them all at once, rather than spreading them out:  Burning Spotlight: This ars ludi post kicks off with a great piece of GMing insight: “Players want play time. Forget about treasure, XP, or hero...

Conflict makes characters interesting, and creates roleplaying opportunities. This principle can be tweaked slightly and applied to NPC design, where it becomes the Conflict Rule: Every NPC who isn’t just there for color needs a conflict. Note that in both variations of this rule, the...

I have a theory that when GMs stat out NPCs, those stats tend to fall into three categories: Full: Every possible detail is covered. Partial: “I just prep what I think I’ll need.” Loose: Mostly winging it. Which approach — or approaches — do you prefer? Why? And what...

After linking to this post last week, I also wanted to feature it here as a guest post. Patrick, who writes Avonia d20, was kind enough to let me do just that — thanks, Patrick! – – – – – There are times when the players aren’t willing to see anything but...

Over on Avonia d20, Patrick (who is Patrick on the TT forums, too) has recently written two excellent GMing advice articles: NPCs Don’t Sit on Fences and Bad Metaphor, Part 1. NPCs Don’t Sit on Fences makes the point that it doesn’t matter how you intended your players to...

Issue #349 of Roleplaying Tips has some great advice on building and managing NPC guides — NPCs that accompany the party as long-term companions. The author bases their advice on two concrete examples of successful guide NPCs from their own game, which is an excellent approach:...

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